Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Gerardo Parra's prior immature histrionics notwithstanding, home plate umpire Bill Welke's tossing of Dodgers starter Clayton Kershaw, after nicking Parra on the elbow with an inside pitch (that was not up in the zone), was nothing but the weakest of sauce. Kershaw, furious, was tossed. Don Mattingly was also tossed. All 724 people in attendance were tossed. Heck, the post-game spread caesar salad was even tossed.

And how bad was this call? As of game's end, the video of the offensive play wasn't even available as a mlb.com highlight. That's because even MLB is fucking embarrassed, Welke. (UPDATE 12:06a:Here's the highlight of the incident itself.)

Kershaw was in line for his 19th win of the year having left the game with a 2-0 lead (5.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 Ks (which unlocked his mlb.com badge of 7 Ks, inexplicably))--but only if the Dodgers could maintain the lead. The Snakes got one in the eighth to make it 2-1, and then Aaron Miles got a one-out RBI single in the bottom of the eighth to put the lead back at two runs.

Kenley Jansen allowed a leadoff single to come around to score with two out, but got the victory by striking out the side, ending the game with a called strike three on Chris Young. Kershaw earns the win, and the Dodgers salvage the last game of the series.

Gotta love the fact that the Dodgers scratched and clawed this victory together after Kershaw had left with such a slim margin. All Monday could talk about on the radio (without telling the score of the game, btw) was that the Diamondbacks had comeback victories all year long.